Wednesday 23 January 2008

Nepal Strike and Corruption


Well, Kathmandu is completely shut down again. There is a general strike and people are out protesting about the rise in the price of petrol.

It was 67 rupees and is now 80 rupees .. (about 60p up to 75p) , a big deal when a typical monthly flat rental is about 800 rupees.

This must be very frustrating for the people of a country which has enough Hydro-Power to provide electricity to India , and become as rich as some of the middle east states on the back of this.

On another level , it means that our incoming shipment of cashmere for mypashmina.co.uk is delayed by 3 or 4 days, a few customers will get probably get grumpy about this and of course in a small part it harms our business and the lively hood of the workers in the factory in Kathmandu.

the root cause .. corruption and greed .